SoTrumpBelieve Must See Movie...

BoardChiri Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

CrawlerChunky In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Dana An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

Mr Black Well, I picked this up on blueray at a local story without knowing anything about it. Unfortunately, it is not what I expected. This is not a theatrical movie. IT's more like a documentary from the history channel or something. It was okay if you like watching TV but don't expect a movie. Historically it is very accurate but I did have some problems with this. For starters,, "from this point Lincoln has 12 days to live." Wow,, seriously? They kept counting this down. Very TV like. Secondly, why does everyone portray Lincoln as the slowest moving man in history? He wasn't that old. I'm pretty sure a guy his age could walk faster than a snail moving through molasses, but every actor seems to think Lincoln moved and walked like a 105 year old man! Finally,, and this is the one that really bugs me. Several times now, including in this movie,, actors doing narration refer to a horse mounted unit as THE CALVARY.. That is wrong. Calvary was the hill where Jesus was crucified. The word is CAVALRY - a horse mounted unit.. the V comes before the L. Does no one in Hollywood or the US. realize this? Why doesn't a script supervisor, set historian, or someone else say,, "Excuse me,, you're pronouncing that word wrong. It just cheapens the whole production.

OJT Unike the highly acclaimed, and deservedly so, Spielberg film "Lincoln", this film goes behind the assassin John Wilkes Booth and his wish not only to kill the president, but also to overthrow the American government. The story behind the shot at Ford's Theater which killed Abraham Lincokn on April 14th 1865. The story is a docudrama, narrated by Tom Hanks, telling about the attempts to kill Lincoln from right months before, until they managed to do so. Interesting film, made for National a geographic Channel, especially for use to historically accuracy and for educational use, based on the best selling book with the same name by Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard. The film is made as accurate as possible, and that down to where people stood on photos, and it is made as a hybrid movie, which jumps out and in of the story, while also using time to dwell in photos and Tom Hanks as the story teller. Hanks is a descendant of Lincoln, hence Nancy Hanks actually was the name of Abraham Lincoln's mother.Not only Lincoln was killed on this night, but it was a conspiracy not unlike a coup d'Etat, when Booth run up on the stage seconds after the killing shouting "Sic semper tyrannis" from the stage afterwards. (So dies a tyrant.) After that starts the biggest man hunt in American history as well.Well worth a watch, and great stuff for usage for educational use, but also compelling watch off others who wants an accurate history telling.

Tad Pole . . . such as Daniel Day-Lewis' LINCOLN in 2012 or Raymond Massey's ABE LINCOLN IN ILLINOIS from 1940. Further, though Mary Surrat was the most interesting person hung, apparently Robert Redford's THE CONSPIRATOR movie about her case from 2010 scared KILLING LINCOLN's crew away, as Mary is NOT EVEN MENTIONED until 1:26:09 of this 1:28:10 long TV movie! So I guess after seeing all the other Lincoln flicks, Abe was feeling like an old buddy and I was sort of wondering what he would think about all 31 minutes and 50 seconds of ads (especially those repeated a dozen or more times, such as the network promos for WICKED TUNA and INSIDE COMBAT RESCUE). As he was pretty old and disabled by his assassination, all of the ads for health remedies (RA.com arthritis treatment, Celebrex arthritis medicine, Kellogg's Frosted Miniwheat Crunch--which is presented as a health food, Cancer Treatment Centers of America, etc.). Google's cute ad about the mom who does a quick search for her young daughter's last-minute disclosure that she has a "Dress like a Presiden's Day" Millard Fillmore assignment surely would have provoked a belly laugh from Abe, given that he knew Fillmore. Sponsor Viking Cruises would have been right up his alley, as he and Mary were planning to see the world as soon as his term ended. At the rate Mary was spending his dough, Abe definitely would have paid attention to the Raymond James financial adviser ads, what with the solid gold apple tree and all. I'm not sure he would have done his booking through Captain Kirk & Expedia, but the JACK THE GIANT SLAYER promo may have been enough to lure him away from that fatal trip to Ford's theater! The night's saving grace, if Abe were watching, is that he would NOT have seen how Ford Motor Co. is ripping off his heirs by using his name and likeness on its imitation Cadillac cars.

Michael_Elliott Killing Lincoln (2013)*** (out of 4) Tom Hanks hosts and narrates this docu-drama about the final days in the life of Abraham Lincoln (Billy Campbell) who would be assassinated by John Wilkes Booth (Jesse Johnson) and change American history forever. Hanks starts off quickly talking about how history has shown Lincoln as a martyr but then mentions that a minute before his death he really wasn't all that popular. This approach isn't something most documentaries take but it pretty much goes away from anything new and instead just tells us the assassination story again. Last year I watched quite a few documentaries on the Civil War and Lincoln so I've become well versed in the subject. This film here is certainly worth watching but at the same time I do question if it was really necessary to do the film like this. We'll see quick re-enactment of events and then we'll flashback to Hanks who is usually sitting in a chair. He will then tell us something about the events going on (ala.. Lincoln has 12 hours to live) and then we go back to the footage. I think the film probably would have worked just as well had it been done as a straight movie without the narration. I also think it would have been great had Hanks just narrated the entire story. As it is the film is entertaining but I think at times we never really connect with the re-enactments and I think Billy Campbell really gets hosed because he never really gets to come to life as Lincoln. It seems most of Lincoln's greatness is told through the narration so the acting of Campbell really doesn't have much of a part to do. On the other hand, Johnson is simply wonderful in the role of Booth and really manages to steal the film. While the subject might be about Lincoln, the actor makes the greatest attention go to the murderer. The look of the film was quite nice even with the obvious at times CGI. History buffs are certainly going to enjoy this and I think the best thing is how is breaks down what was going on the day of the assassination.